The Scientific Synergy Core (Core A) is the intellectual fulcrum of this research core center. It represents a low-cost high impact core which will dramatically strengthen the hearing, balance and chemical senses sciences at the University of Michigan and in the research community in the Michigan - Ohio region. Specifically, the core will promote scientific information exchange and scholarly discussions through regular contacts, further technology transfer to enhance research, aid principal investigators in the training of students, fellows and staff, and encourage new and increased collaboration through the formation of special interest groups. Within the P30 research cores the regular contacts between the principal investigators and key personnel of the cores will remain the customary avenue of communication. Going beyond these interactions, however, all students, fellows, and laboratory staff are included in the meetings of the interest groups of Core A and the annual meetings that we are proposing. Despite its ambitions of maintaining a multi-institutional synergy core. Core A does not add significantly to the P30 budget because of the proximity of all participating laboratories, which eliminates the necessity for any overnight stays and associated costs for meetings, discussions, or service training. The educational training aspect of the proposed P30 Core Center includes a ten-week summer internship program for deaf and hard-of-hearing students. These students are an underrepresented minority in NIDCD mission-related research. Their inclusion in the Scientific Synergy Core will address the problem at the undergraduate level at a time when these students make career choices. By providing this resource to them and to our investigators, we will build novel mentoring relationships and train the next generation of scientists from this underrepresented minority group. The intellectual interactions provided by this core will consolidate mentoring relationships, encourage collaborations, and through discussion, enhance the quality of our research, our grant applications and our publications. These aims will aid the growth of young groups and make established ones more competitive in their attempts to obtain grant funding.